Quest Professional is not in the stores from Meta, although inventory remains to be obtainable at some retailers.
Meta introduced the retirement of each Quest 2 and Quest Professional at its Join convention again in September, saying that the 2 headsets will not be obtainable when inventory runs out or on the finish of the yr, whichever comes first.
For Quest 2, inventory ran out inside just a few weeks of Join. For Quest Professional, it seems the opposite clause utilized. With the arrival of the brand new yr, the headset’s web page on Meta’s web site has been changed with a “Meta Quest Professional is not obtainable” discover, alongside a picture and value of Quest 3, Meta’s new highest-end providing.
With Quest 2, Quest Professional, and the 128GB mannequin of Quest 3 gone, Meta’s headset lineup has been simplified to:
- Quest 3S (128GB): $300
- Quest 3S (256GB): $400
- Quest 3 (512GB): $500
Quest Professional: A Pioneering Failure
After Quest 2 grew to become the primary mainstream VR headset, Meta hoped it may construct on this success by introducing a high-end Quest to serve fanatics and companies.
Quest Professional launched in late 2022 at $1500. It featured Meta’s first pancake lenses, QD-LCD shows with Mini-LED native dimming, eye monitoring, face monitoring, a curved battery within the rear of the strap, and the ringless self-tracking Contact Professional controllers.
In some ways Quest Professional was a pioneering headset. However in others it was severely missing, given its value.
John Carmack Tried To Kill Quest Professional, Predicting Failure
Carmack says he predicted it will be “a industrial failure and distract the groups for a yr, stopping them from doing extra useful work”.
By the point Quest Professional launched, leaks of a Quest 3 arriving a yr later with a twice as highly effective GPU at half the worth had already emerged, severely dampening the headset’s worth proposition.
Additional, Quest Professional’s underwhelming decision, grainy passthrough, lack of means to generate a scene mesh for blended actuality, and Meta’s cartoonish avatars not being detailed sufficient to do the face monitoring sensors justice led to mixed-at-best opinions.
Simply 4 months after Quest Professional launched Meta reduce its value from $1500 to $1000. This sort of value reduce so quickly after launch was unprecedented, and strongly suggests the headset vastly missed its launch gross sales targets.
Quest Professional Value Reduce To $1000 Simply 4 Months After Launch
Quest Professional’s value is being reduce from $1500 to $1000 simply 4 months after launch. The value of the 256GB Quest 2 mannequin can also be being diminished, from $500 to $430.
By round a yr after launch Meta was making a gift of Quest Professional headsets to Roblox creators, when giving them a Quest 2 would have been completely high-quality. And final yr Meta eliminated the whiteboard, which was designed round the pressure-sensitive stylus ideas of Quest Professional’s controllers, from Horizon Workrooms.
A number of builders have informed UploadVR they see solely a tiny fraction of their person base on Quest Professional. As such, nearly no Quest sport builders took the time so as to add help for its eye-tracked foveated rendering.
Meta Horizon OS Will Run On Headsets From ASUS & Lenovo
Meta is rebranding its Quest software program platform to Meta Horizon OS and opening it as much as third-party headset makers, together with ASUS and Lenovo.
With Quest Professional off the market, Meta not sells any headsets with eye monitoring or face monitoring. It is doable one in every of its Horizon OS companions, equivalent to ASUS or Lenovo, will launch a headset with these options a while later this yr, and we’ll hold a detailed eye on these firms for any indicators of that taking place.
